Funding boost for social start-ups

Six social start-ups – six individual grants. All the Impact Fund’s (Wirkungsfonds) third round finalists – JUMEN, Wefugees, Eed be Eed, HelpTo, ZuBaKa and CodeDoor – left the Social Impact Lab in Frankfurt overjoyed as a winner!

Under the umbrella of the Impact Fund, Deutsche Bank, SAP and Social Impact gGmbH support start-ups that tangibly improve the social and economic integration of refugees in Germany. The Fund – a first of its kind – began in 2016 and provides non-repayable grants for refugee-targeted social enterprises.

It is part of Made for Good, Deutsche Bank’s enterprise programme for social good that aims to help start-ups and early-stage enterprises build momentum and capacity.

In the Impact Fund’s founding year, 200,000 euros were set aside to help twelve social enterprises develop their business models. During the Impact Fund finale the remaining 60,000 euros were allocated. And it was an exciting contest: each of the finalists applied for the maximum grant of 25,000 euros to scale their business model.

— JUMEN was awarded the largest grant of 22,500 euros – it offers legal advice to help refugee children get into school.
— ZuBaKa received 15,000 euros to continue coordinating offers for vocational orientation, language training and mentoring at local schools.
— Wefugees´ online dialogue platform for refugees and volunteers won 7,500 euros from the Impact Fund.
— Eed be Eed ('hand in hand') provides an online newspaper in Arabic written by refugees, for refugees. Not only was the startup rewarded with a grant of 5,000 euros – it will receive further coaching by Social Impact in the future.
— HelpTo brings happiness to refugee children at Christmas - with a present. For this, it was provided 5,000 euros.
— The CodeDoor team, which also received 5,000 euros, educates refugees to become software developers and teaches them how to code.

The Impact Fund’s first year-finale was a big success. Thanks to the funding
received, all the social enterprises can now quickly scale up their commitment and contribute to the successful integration of refugees into society and the German labour market.
Congratulations!